Attention has been paid to human internal body fat in view of health maintenance. Specifically, increase in the internal body fat promotes adult diseases for example, and therefore monitoring the internal body fat can lead to prevention of these diseases and problems. There is an index called BMI for evaluating such internal body fat. Since BMI can be obtained from height and weight of a patient, it is readily used as an index for obtaining information on the internal body fat.
Another index for assessing the patient's internal body fat is body fat ratio. Recently, a variety of body fat meters capable of obtaining the body fat ratio are available on the market. By using these body fat meters, the body fat ratio as an indicator of the state of internal body fat can be obtained easily at home for example.
Incidentally, among the internal body fat, the visceral fat is believed to be a factor in particular contributing to various complications of heart diseases, diabetes, and so on. For this reason, the visceral fat is considered to be an important factor in view of health maintenance.
Here, the BMI and the body fat ratio described above are information obtained as an average data on the internal body fat as existing in the whole body. Therefore, even if BMI or the body fat ratio gives a value which does not indicate any health problems, it is not necessarily possible to determine if there is any health problem in relation with the visceral fat.
Information on the visceral fat can be obtained through a diagnosing method such as abdominal tomography by means of CT scanning, MRI and so on. Such a method allows direct observation of the abdomen itself, making it possible to obtain accurate information on the visceral fat.
However, such a diagnosis using CT scanning or the like is only possible with a large scale apparatus installed at a major hospital, and the results can be obtained only after a certain length of time necessary for measurement and data analysis. In addition, highly specific expertise is required for the operation of the apparatus and the data analysis. Therefore, the method is not available as a handy means for obtaining visceral fat information at home for example.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a visceral fat determining device that can be used easily at home or the like, for obtaining information on visceral fat.